5th ISA Forum of Sociology (6-11 July 2025)

In the epoch of globalization, the ideas of neoliberalism have been seen as a panacea for securing efficiency. Public managerialism is thus introduced to accomplish this mission through the strategy of devolution. While individual units are empowered to engage in self-decision, this autonomy requires them to be responsible for their outcomes. As this situation legitimatizes performance management evoking performativity, shaping subjectivities becomes the top priority of neoliberal governmentality. Central to the project of subjectivation is to instill certain values and ideas into people’s self-knowledge through their souls, as manifested in the OECD’s PISA, by which international comparisons yield the discourse of hope and fear, telling people how to think and act. When human capital discourse is fused into neoliberal governmentality, efficiency becomes a moral issue commanding social members to become self-improvers committed to lifelong learning that promises to enhance their competence and honor themselves. These governing technologies implicitly but powerfully direct people’s mindsets through the technique of subjectivation that deprives their critical faculty. They are, in turn, educated as conformists who take efficiency as the yardstick measuring teacher competence and professional development. The above scenarios show that the state has declined toward capital accumulation, significantly weakening social justice's voice. Considering this crisis, this section calls for papers on related themes as follows:

1. neoliberalism and education reform
2. performance management and performativity
3. international competitiveness, teaching quality and teachers’ accountability
4. PISA, data governance and teachers’ subjectivities
5. human capital discourse and lifelong learning
6. efficiency and social justice